The Sun. — London, England, 1809-08-02 00:00:00

nro'o.:ne that none of their would have pro-. anv e5 . e.-t whatever on the enemy's fleet. fiat although not one of the enemy's ships waii actually destroyed by means of fire ships, - yet the t*Tror excited by their approach induced the enemy ,o cut their cables, and exposed them, by their run ning aground, to the attack which ensued. I now come to the proceedings of the 12th April, which commence with the signal that the enemy could be destroyed, and which destruotion it is im owed to me I delayed or negleoed. At 48 minutes after five, A. M. the imperieuse, t;;L:ri about three miles from the enemy, and about same distance from the Caledonia, made the si,inal to me by telegraph, that " seven of the ene my's slops were on shore, and that half the fleet could destroy them." The attual situation of the French fleet.at that time' was this :—Seven of their ships were on shore on tile Pallas; two had escaped towards the Cha rente, and two lay either at their originalanchorage, or a very little removed from it, with their broad sales bearing upon any thing that might approach, to attack the ships on shore. I ordered the fleet to be unmoored immediately; the wind was at N. W. and the tide was then nearly at the last quarter ebb, and much too far spent to admit of a force being sent in, so as to etfela any thia , z, with, the possibility of returning in case of disaster, before the making of the flood, which would effednally have locked bp our ships within the enemy's confined anchorage during the whole f)f that tide. Here they would have been exposed not only to the point-blank shot from the batteries, but also to the broadsides of the above mentioned two line of battle ships then lying in Aix Road, znd which even, without assistance from the batteries must have entirely crippled every one of our ships, in this approach through so narrow a channel; be sides which, some of the grounded ships were suf. fleiently upright, and so situated as to enable them to bring their guns to bear upon the entrance. I would here submit to the Courii, whether the idea which appears to have been entertained by. Lord Cochrane, that a force could have been sent in so . as to have arrived before low water in the morning, was not in itself preposterous and impradiczible. • Upon the fullest consideration that no possible at tempt could be made until the tide had flowed for some time, unless a previous change of wind should take place, all I had to do was to make every pre , ?oration for the attack on the enemy's grounded ships ; accordingly I made the signal for the fleet to weigh, and the Rear-Admiral and Captains being assembled en board the Caledonia, I gave orders to the Commander of the Etna, the only bomb pre tent,, to proceed as soon as the tide would permit at vessel to approach near enough, tb bombard the enemy's ships; I at the same time ordered the Lisolent,-Conflid and Growler gun-brigs to accom pany her, and direccted the Captains of the Valiant, Bellona, and Revenge, with the frigates, to take an advanced anchorage as near as passible to the Boy a: t shoal, to be in - readiness to proceed to the attack as soon as the water had sufficiently flowed to enable them to do so. At between nine and ten A.M. which was much before' the flood was sufficiently made to commence effettive operations, the fleet ran in, and came to an anchor within about three miles distant from the enemy's fortress of Aix ; the three ships before mentioned, with the frigates, anchored about a mile Dearer to the Boysrt, but the bomb and brigs did nut come to. As the Hood tide made, three of the seven ships whch bad grounded on the Pallas shoal, and were there farthest twin us, being lightened, succeeded in N arping off, and made for the Charente. The two line-of-battle ships still at their ,ancho rage, in the situation before described, took at the same time advantage of the flood, and proceeded likewise towards the river. Most, if not all, of these five ships now ran aground at the mouth of the Charente, and were never assailable. These movements of the enemy's ships were not, as .I submit to the - Court, to be prevented by any means that I couid adopt, with the smallest chance, of success, and without his Majesty's ships being .put to the most unwarrantable peril, and when, as Ite'ar-Admiral Stoptord has, in his evidence on the part of the prosecution . , most emphaticially describ ed, "'Oars would have been all the loss, and the enemy's ell the advantage." The wind-blew directly in, s 6 that in the event of our ships being crippled, while the flood tide Was,. running, which appeared inevitable, it would have been impossible for them td have yolked out, or to have retreated to an anchorage out of the reach of the enemy's shot and, shells the consequence of whchcould scarcely have ,beea less than their utter de,truttion. •Ti►e:;e serious impediments induced me to delay the atnick until the latter part of the flood, in orcl:r to give any ships, which might be disabled on their tappioach, a chance of returning, by means of the receding tide. Had the wind been' faVourahle'for sailing both in and out, or even the latter • only,' there coulA have beLfn no doubt that the sooner the enemy's ships were attacked the better. And I think the Count will allow, that I am com pletely- borne out, in 'what I have stated, by the sentiments I.vhich, it.will be proved, 'were express '..cd to the 1:y Lord Cochrane when he came onboard the Caledonia after the action; that had I acted upon his signal, and sent in at that, time half the fleet', he calculated upon the loss of three or four of his Majesty's liue of battle ships. And I have :moreover to observe, that it, in defiance ot. the ob i; ruction of the other ships 'of the'enemy, I had sent in a force, before the three ships had Warped off the Pallas Shoal : it is a positive fact, that it could not have zdt anted to the attack of those three ships, un account of the shoal water. , It appears by the log 7 bOok, of the Imperieuse, that a 34) minutes past 1 t, she , weighed and run in; in company with, the Etna bomb and a gun-brig. ;.'he tact is, that the Etna passed ; , the Imperieu,e whilst . at anchor, about one, 'and.that she began the, attack some time before the Ituperieuke arrived up ; haft' au, flour afterwards the Imperieuse and the 'EL:ogle followed the Etna, and gun brigs in, to the attach, and between fen minutes before, and seven ininntey after two ; "as will be seen by a reference tp the log-books upon the -table ; I ordered the Jude- Llnicopi; Aigle, and Emerald frigates, Ix tne V al.qui Mid Revenge (and the Pallas a few' Elitiutes lator) to weigh ; - -Captain shgh, the senior 01? leer, having some hours before received my direc tions for his proceeding against the enemy. The ImPerieuse opened her fire at abut twenty minutes after two, the Aigle at three, and the other ships as soon after as the flowing tide permitted. In consequence of strong north westerly winds, the flood tide continued running u►itil past three in the afternoon, which Lord Cochrane has nut notic ed in his evidence. In my letter of the 10th May to the Admiralty, could not state these circumstances so minutely as I am now enabled to do, by a reference since made to the log-books. At ten minutes after four, P. M. the enemy's ship Calcutta, and the Ville de Varsovie and Aqui lon about an hour after, were taken possession of by the boats of the advanced squadron, and set on fire, as soon as the prisoners were removed; a short time after Le Tonnere was burnt by the enemy.— This ship is admitted by the evidence of Lord Coch rane to have been out of the reach of our fire; and it is a notorious fa& that the three decker, and the other two ships that got afloat, had been aground at some distance beyond the Tonnere. • In this manner the Court will find, that the four ships capable of being attacked at the time the sig nal was made (if the Tonnere may be so considered, of which I doubt), were completely destroyed; the other three of the seven first on shore never having, as I have already stated, been in a situation to be assailed. And I venture most positively to assert, that the destru6lion of those ships would nbt have been ef feeted, if I had not delayed the attack until the time I did. At the close of the afternoon, I judged it advis able to attempt to follow up our success by an attack upon the fire-ships that had escaped to the mouth of the Charente, which I thought it might be possible to elle& during the night. .1 thetetore sent Rear- Admiral Stopford, in the Cxsar, with the Theseus, and the fire-ships and boats of the fleet with Mr. Congreve's rockets, and gave the Rear-Admiral dis cretional orders to proceed as he should judge pro per, and for his applying that force as he should think fit, and according as circumstances should ren der it expedient. Scarcely had the Caesar reached Aix Road, before she grounded, and lay in a very perilous situation (as has been deposed by the Rear-Admiral), exposed also to the point-blank shot from the batteries. The Rear-Admiral perceiving that nothing could be effeaed by the line of battle ships, all of which had grounded (as had also some of the frigates), and that they lay in imminent danger, and satisfied that if any thing further could be etleded towards the destrudion of these ships, it could only be by smal ler vessels ; he therefore very judiciously, before day-light on the 13th, availed himself of a provi dential shift of wind, which enabled him, when the line of battle ships floated, to extricate them from that danger, and to return to Basque Roads. Captain Bligh, of the Valiant, also on his return reported to me, that it was found impraaicable to destroy the three-decked ship, and others, which were lying at the entrance of the Charante, as the former (which was the outer one) was protected by three lints of boats placed in advance from her. In addition to the incontestible proofs already ad duced of the impra6ticability of effeding any further destru&ion of the enemy's fleet, I will, advert to the high professional character of Rear-‘4dmiral Stop ford, and Captains Beresford, Bligh, and Kerr, who cannot for an instant be suppo-ed likely to omit any circumstance that could effeCt_the objed for which they were sent by me into Aix Roads; and 1 am morally . certain that they did not withdraw their ships until it was wholly impracticable to annoy the enemy further, or until it appeared to those Officers that the destruction of their own ships would be the .certain consequence of their longer continuance in Aix Road. _ _ _ Lord Cochrane remained in the Road of Aix dur ing the 13th and 14th, accompanied by the Pallas frigate, the sloopS and gun-brigs, and Etna bomb, but nothing was attempted by the frigates. During the 13th the Etna was employed in throwing shells, the Whiting schooner in firing rockets, and the other small vessels firing upon the enemy's ships.on shore ) when the tide permitted them to approach. On the . 1 4th, having by signal direeted the Impe riense to join me,' I ordered Captain Wolfe, of the Aigle,. to take the command of the small vessels ad vanced ; these, with the Etna, continued firing on the enemy's ships at the entrance of the Charente, as opportunity offered, during the remainder of the day, but without effed. On the 15th, I dispatched Sir ,Harry Neale to their Lordships; in the Irnperieuse, with my pUblic letter of the 14th April; giving an account of the service which had been perfqrrned, 1 . • From the 15th to the 24th, the attack on the enemy's ships on shore at the mouth of the Charente was continued by the bombs (tile Thunder having arrived on the 19th), assisted by the small vessels, as wind and weather permitted ; but the enemy had, by throwing overboard their guns and stores, got so high up, that even the gun-brigs and other vessels of light draught frequently grounded in their endea vours to approach, and never could get sufficiently near to produce any effed. The orders of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to me of the 14th of April, to detach two squadrons 'of four ships of the line each, to cruize, for the purpose- of intercepting the French ships which had escaped from L'Orient, in February; having with the other orders I received from their. Lonlshipsbetween the 17th of March and the '2 t h of April, been read' upon opening of the Court, 1 tafe occasion to observe, that I had anticipated the orders of their Lordships in this resped, and the success, in the operations of the 12th, without the loss of any of the King's ships, having enabled me to do so, I had previously appointed two squa drons for that service, one of which had adually sailed before I received the orders of their Lord shCps thereupon. • From the 24th to the 29th of April, nothing material occurred, and having received the Admi 7 . ratty Letter of the 22d, of April, signifying, " that their Lordships considering the state of the enemy's force, in consequence of the brilliant success of the fleet under my command, so much reduced as to render my fUrther presence unnecessary, directed me to repair to Spithead in the Caledonia," I according ly completed the arrangements of the fleets and proceeded in the Caledonia to England on the '29th of April. . . • Previous to my !caving Basque Roads, one of thd .euetny's frigates was set on tire by themselves at the entrance of the Charante, another was observed obe wrecked further up that river. The number, of ships that, escaped without injury, did not from the best information exceed one or two line of battle ships, and two frigates ; what may have been the fate of the remainder, I leave to be considered by the Members of this Honourable Court, who are well qualified to judge of the 'condition of ships which had been so long and so repeatedly aground. By the foregoing narrative, 'as well as by the log and signal log of the Caledonia (to which, as also to every coned log of the fleet, I am as desirous to refer to as Lord Cochrane may be), it will, I conceive be seen, that I fully meet the charge : , which has been preferred against me, and if the im pression arising out of this inquiry should prove less favourable to Lord Cochrane, than that which may have beed produced by my letter to the Lords Com missioners of the Admiralty of the 14th of APril, his Lordship must be sensible, that, as the instiga tor of this Court Martial, he will himself have been the cause of this chan'e of sentiment. I have been willing to grant to his Lordship the fullest credit for his personal bravery, and for his judicious manner of approaching the enemy in the Imperieuse, to which points the commendation expressed in my letter of the 14th of April related. For in fact, the success of the first part of the enterprise, as I have before observed, arose from the terror excited by the appearance of the fire-ships, as they failed in the principal effea they were intend ed to produce,' and the blast of the explosion ves sels under, his Lordship's immediate diredion, did not take place by any means so near to the enemy's. ships as his Lordshfp had proje&ed. The general result, however, of the attack was so successful, that under that impressiOn, I did not hesitate to express in my public letter the degree of approbation which is therein marked, passing over circumstances not al together satisfaCtory to me, and not at that time ne cessary to be brought into public notice. The Court is now in possession of all the faEts and circumstances on which I rest my justification, and it remains to be considered how_ far they are affected by the evidence produced on the part of the prosecution. - I have first to refer to the evidence of the Second in Command, and to that of the Captains of two of the frigates engaged in the attack, viz. the Rear- Admiral Stopford and Captains Rodd and Wolfe.. These Officers, far from supporting any part of the charge made against me, have distindly denied there having been any neglect, delay, or deficiency, in any part of my condud in Basque. Roads ; and I am persuaded, that had the Prosecutor called all the other witnesses summoned upon the trial, a corre sponding testimony would have been given by each of them. I have next to refer to the evidence of the log and signal books of the fleet; on which the charge purports to be founded, and I must here beg to call your attention to the very unusual circumstance of there being already on your table two log-books of the same ship (namely, the Imperieuse), and materially differing from each other; one of them produced by the master of the Imperieuse, as the authentic public document of thnt ship, to the ac curacy of which he has deposed ; and the other pre sented by Lord CoChrane, and admitted by his Lordship to be a compilation by himself in Lon don, from materials which are not produced to the Court. In addition to these circumstances, I have ,to lay upon your table a third paper, purporting to be also a log-book of the Imperieuse, but differing from the two already before you. This paper was delivered to me by Lord Cochi4ne, in obedience to my order Of the 12th of May last, to fiirnish me. " with a copy of the books of ,logs and signals of his Majes ty's ship Imperieuse, under his command, from/ I tif to 15th April inclusive," and to this log the Court' would find affixed his Lordship's signature. The Court itself having so attentively inspeeted the Master's log, I need not point out the alterations evidently made therein ; and it cannot fail to observe the variations in .the other two logs ; I must, how-- ever, remark, that among the deviations in these pa pers from the ship's original fog, the signal imme diately in question, which is, recorded in the latter to have been for " half the fleet," stands in both these compilations as having been made for " part of the fleet " only ; and of the two )9gs received from Lord Cochrane, that only produced in Court by himself records the circumstance of his having hailed the Indefatigable, and proposed to her a joint attack upon the enemy's ship the Ocean ; and I can not help here reminding the Court of the applica tion made by the Master of theimperieuse for access to the Indefatigable's log. I beg, leave to subMit, whether documents formed some time after the events 'they record took place, and so contrary to the pratice of the Navy, cap be deemed authentic, or ought to be referred to as, or in stipport of,' evidence before this Court. . I have no doubt the . signal made by Lord Coch tune on 'the morning of the t2lh of April, which forms a part of the charge against me, will, combin ed with other subsequent signals, appear to the Court unprecedented and improper ; of this his Lordship now seems aware, from the manner in which he has expressed himself in his evidence ; and that there nay be no doubt of the accuracy of the signal log-book of the Caledonia, I must again call before you the Signal Officer, to shew that the signal of re call on the 13th April, said . to have been observed by the Imperieuse, Was never made by the Caledo nia ; and also that the signal of the 14th; recorded in the Caledonia's log as made by the Imperieuse, " that if permitted to remain, can destroy enemy," is denied by Lord Cochrane ever to have been made. I have yet to call the attention-of the Court to the plan drawn by Lord Cochrane of the position of the enemy's ships as .they lay aground -on the morning of-the 12th April, and to that position marked upon the chart, , verified by Mr. Stokes ; the former laid down from uncertain data, the latter from angles measared, and other observations made upon the spot; the difference between the two is too appa rent to escape the notice of the Court, and the re pecStive merits of these charts will not, I thitik, ad mit of a comparison. The accuracy attributed by Lord Cochrane to the French charts will, I doubt not, seem very extraor dinary, after it shall be shewn in evidence that his I,9rd4hip has expressed a very opposite opinion. , It now Only remains for tue to examine in what manner Lord Cochrane has attempted by his unsup. parted opinion to maintain the charge. This is to be colleded from the long narrative evidence given by his Lordship. It cannot, I a:n sure, be deemed necessary for me to follow him through the whole of this evidence. There are, however, some parts of it that require particular animadversion. In the course of his evidence, Lord Cochrane, in allusion to the danger which would attend his going without encouragement to the attack of the ships at the mouth of the Charante, says, speaking of him self, " A heavy, a very heavy responsibility would lie upon my shoulders in case of disaster, which in • naval operations are sometimes unavoidable : if had my cable shot away, for instance, I might have been sunk." Yet, whilst on the one hand his Lord ship seems to have been so sensible of the weight of responsibility imposed upon himself by the command of a frigate and a few small vessels, he appears, on the other, to have been unmindful of the far heavier degree of responsibility .attached to my command during so complicated an undertaking; in alluding to-the dangers of which, I must take this opportunity to mention five furnaces for heating shot, which Lord Cochrane reported to me to have himself dis covered when he went in to reconnoitre, previous to the attack. Lord Cochrane states that 74-gun ships may go into an inner anchorage between the Boyart shoal and the Pallas, at any time Of the tide. He asserts also that the tide rises only from ten to twelve feet. By the French chart, which he pro duced to confirm his deposition, it appears that there is a bank to pass over before ships can get into that anchorage, with tioin eighteen to twenty feet at low water. But by the charts'of the Master of the Fleet o and Master of the Caledonia, who sounded upon the bank, it appears that there is only from fourteen to nineteen feet, and the bank full of knolls ; under these circumstances, if Lord Cochrane's opinion be corret, relative to the ,rise and fall of the tide, no man in his senses would venture a seventy-four over it in the smoothest water at less than three-quarters flood; and therefore as to the refuge that this inner anchorage would afford a crippled ship, how little would the probability be that the opportunity of both tide and wind should offer for a crippled ship at the moment at which it was most wanted, to pass over the bank, and get out of the reach of the batteries ; but if I had even previously known as much of this inner anchorage as I now do, I would not, as the wind was at the time, have done otherwise than I did. And if Lord Cochrane really knew what he has now professed to-have known, when he was in Aix Roads, it was a duty impe riously incumbent upon him to have communicated that information on the afternoon of the 12th, to the Captains of the line of battle ships which be saw in so perilous a situation, aground within point-blank range of the batteries. Lord Cochrane has expressed an opinion, that two or three sail of the line sent in on the morning of the might, by running up, on the verge of the Boyart shoal, have passed to leeward of the tvvo French ships remaining at anchor. This I declare to have been absolutely impradicable, as well trod the raking fire of the two ships afloat, and of the upright ones on shore on our approach, and the fire of the batteries, as from the shoal water close tio" der their lee. The testimony of Captain Rodd, the only witness examined on this point, on the part of the prosecution, corroborates my opinion, which have no doubt will be further supported by the evi dence of other competent witnesses I propose calling. With respe& to the force of the Aix batteries, apprehend what appeared to Lord Cochrane, and io the Master of the ship, as ruins of tiie fort, were is fa& materials for improving dr increasing the works. Indeed, can it be natural to suppose that the ene iny, who are so active in forming batteries wherever they can be useful, and whose engiueers are consi dered to be equal to any, would of all moments choose that for dismantling or blowing up workss when they expe4ed those works would be -most. required; for it is very certain the enemy was as full! apprised of our intentions of attacking tbe'ir fleet 0 myself; and it will, perhaps, be considered less likely that the enemy should weaken their defence; on the Isle d'Aix, raised evidently for the profec tedion of their fleet, when at the same time 11)0' were endeavouring to form others on the lioyart shoal as further peotedion for it. Relative to the service that had been performed, and what might possibly still be further attempted towards the destruction of the enemy's ships, Lord Cochrane states a conversation to have passed be' tweet) his Lordship and myself, on his return. from Am - Roach, im which he represents me to have said., i 6 that.if he threw blame it would appear like arid' ganity claiming all the merit to himself." I, how' ever, trust the Court will not conceive that the e 2 ' pression of casting blame has any allusion to my con' duty ; for, as I have before said, Lord Cochrap ° never expressed one syllable from which I could tonal the most faint idea that he felt disappointed al ?n) 7 , thing reqing with me. His Lordshipts..allnsion reference only to the several Officers who acted WO him in Aix Roads; upon whom generally he case blame, without giving the smallest intimation, eiiner by word or manner, that in his expressions of dissle tisfaaion he included his Commander in Chief. By the manner in which Lord,Cochrarie has e%' pressed himself, it might, perhaps, be coriclucle 4 that I had been 'desirous he should bear my di'' . patches to England ; and after the caution he repi; sents me to have given him, it might, if I allow?_, this statement to pass uncontridiated, be supposeu by some that I proposed this as au inducement to $e cure Lord Cochrane's silence; whereas, when hi* Lordship recalls the circumstances to his mind, iC will, I am sure, lead him to acknowledge that, 5 ° far from pressing this service upon him, in the hr" instance, I - gave him to understand that Sir Harri Neale, the Captain of the fleet, was to bear Loy di" patches, and at which Lord Cochrane, I positive], declare, expressed evident marks of dissati,lacti o "2 and it certainly will appear to every reflecting that my sending his Lordship to England, with ori. der., to go to the Admiralty, betray e d no d e sike ° concealment, nor apprehension of any repreSet it tion Lord Cochrane might make of my conduct. .1.., 7 p0n a general review of th e evi d ence o f Lord Cochrane, it will appear that his Lufdship founded his statement on the-n arra ti ve l ug , conipa w c since his return to England—on the French chat Rlld 94 the position in which is placed, in